the history books got us wrong (all wrong, and then some more)
by Kuro49
Summary: Scott/Herc/Chuck. When the Marshal returns with Raleigh Becket, Striker's pilots come with Scott Hansen in toll.


Written for the kinkmeme prompt: scott hansen returns for pitfall au. _Just in case this meme has its own triumphant return... I'd be super interested in an AU where Stacker doesn't just bring back one exiled ex-pilot, he brings back two. Whatever Scott did to get kicked out of the program in its golden age, surely by Pitfall the PPDC needs live bodies to throw at the breach more than it needs moral rectitude. _

_So: at the edge of their hope, with the world on the line, how does the Shatterdome react to an even more damaged third Hansen? (shippy, gen, 'cesty, totally up to you!)_

It's a brand new year, and holy fuck, I tried a hand at Scott Hansen and ended up with an entire fic in his POV. And I am sure this is nothing at all like OP asked aside from the fact that Scott comes back for Pitfall. (No really, this is just porn with a little bit of plot sprinkled on top to cover the fact that this is all just porn in the end).

XXX

**the history books got us wrong (all wrong, and then some more)**

XXX

He looks like bad news, and regrets made at seventeen. Once more at twenty-one, and then so much more when he's hit his thirties where he just stopped counting altogether. When the Marshal returns from Anchorage, Alaska, with Raleigh Becket, Striker Eureka's pilots come to Hong Kong with Scott Hansen in toll.

And when the Marshal comes around for the introductions, it is Hercules who takes Raleigh's hand and Scott who drags the kid into his arms for a hug and condolences murmured against the shell of his ear.

"Sorry about your brother," and it is spoken with a kind of solemn respect that has never been there before. Scott Hansen pulls back, stuffing his hands into his pockets in the process before his blue eyes rest on the Marshal in his tailored coat.

"Marshal," he greets him, standing there at the centre of the Shatterdome looking like he is daring Stacker Pentecost to a bare knuckled boxing match, "you look good."

It is as if one damaged Mark III pilot isn't enough. In this last ditch effort, Stacker Pentecost would think that needing the rotten apple of the Hansens bunch should say something about what he has come to. Stacker shakes the man's hand, and remembers that there is little about him that has changed. "I expected otherwise but you don't look so bad yourself, Scott."

He isn't wrong, but he isn't completely right either.

"That's cold. Not that I can't say I don't understand. But try to see me as more than another warm body to throw at the breach though, Marshal. I quite like my life—"

"Knock it off, Scott."

Herc cuts him off with a frown, hands crossing over his chest even though he is itching to put a hand to the crook of Scott's arm, physically retrain the man from mouthing off like he's got any right.

Scott looks to him with a throwaway grin, and there is a second where he holds his gaze but the next, he is already turning around to stride right back to where the other half of Striker's pilots is.

.

Universal compatibility is not a family trait.

It's a fight between the two ex-Rangers, and that's the thing. It shouldn't be one. This is not how drift compatibility comes by when Raleigh has Scott hitting the Kwoon mat, again. With the breath knocked out of his lungs and his hanbō clattering off to the side, the room goes silent aside from Mako Mori's announcement.

"4-1."

"I'm too old for this." Scott calls out from the floor, eyes squinting against the harsh fluorescent lights right above the Kwoon. He isn't sweating out of his skin, but the plain white tank he grabbed from Herc's duffle is clinging to his back and front.

"You okay?"

"I'll live, Becket." Scott waves away the helping hand and stands up on his own two feet, wincing when he touches the bruises that will surely form.

He catches Raleigh's concerned gaze and he doesn't know what it is about the broken kid (doesn't imagine the possible parallel because he hasn't lost his brother to the fucking nightmares from the ocean, not yet anyway), but he wants to help, in that roundabout way only the Hansens have perfected into an art.

"Just ask her, Becket, world's ending already." Scott mutters when he gives Raleigh a light pat on the back.

Stepping off of the mat, he shoves his feet into his unlaced boots and walks out of the Kwoon with a careless wave back behind him where Raleigh finally points his hanbō at the only other person he's got any desires to have a conversation with.

Mako Mori returns his steady gaze with equal weight.

.

At the edge of their hope, with the world on the line, you would think the joke is on them. And maybe Herc isn't there for the drift compatibility tests, but Chuck is. Hanging around in the back of the crowd, he has his arms crossed over his chest, hat pulled down low over his eyes but the smirk cutting across his face is in one clean sharp line.

It feels like maybe the last laugh belongs to them after all.

Or not, considering what happens next.

.

Scott is standing in LOCCENT, fingers wrapped around a power cord that is thicker than his arm, the world around him glowing in a bright neon plasma blue. If this is the end of the world as he knows it, he figures he would die a little differently than a drift gone wrong.

He hasn't forgotten about Gipsy Danger. Oh no, not one bit. MN-20 has been his last Kaiju, MN-20 has also been Yancy Becket's last Kaiju before Knifehead. And as much as he hated the Jaeger program, he's been a Ranger once too.

Scott Hansen is no moral compass. But he isn't quite so rotten either.

He hasn't come to Hong Kong from Australia to see the world to end this way for them.

Chuck comes up behind him and wraps a hand around the power source, and with Tendo Choi's help, the three of them shuts down Gipsy. The whirling of the Jaeger's plasma canon turning into silence lets him breathe once more.

It is almost like there isn't enough reasons to hate the colour blue already. He doesn't think he can ever forget the sight of LOCCENT being cast in that glow, having Herc and Chuck standing right there in the room.

Scott Hansen almost swings his own fist at Raleigh Becket's face if Chuck hasn't already beaten him there first.

.

The double event takes out two Jaeger. And Hercules Hansen breaks his collarbone. The red of their flare guns light up the sky, and for all that Scott Hansen imagines he will be doing when he finally faces the end of the world, this isn't it.

This is far from it.

.

"You're not piloting with my kid."

"Kid's my nephew."

"Kid's my _son_."

Chuck glares at them both as he throws his spoon into his tray of what could have been mashed potatoes, the colour looks right, the taste not so much. But then again, a lot of things taste like cardboard even with the ports opened.

"I'm right here you know." Chuck scowls from where he is sitting across from the two of them in the mess hall, Max's head perched on his lap. "And I'm not a kid, you arseholes."

"Finish your dinner." Herc says instead, motioning with a spoon to the half full plate that is still sitting in front of his son. Scott rolls his eyes and Chuck's scowl deepens.

"You disengaged early, dad. You're _hurt_."

"Chuck—"

He stands up from the table and the sharp whistle he lets out has Max scrambling from the bench to follow after his master as he turns away.

"Charlie!" Scott calls out when he sees that Herc isn't about to with the way he sighs into his plate.

"It's _Chuck_, Uncle Scott!"

He takes a swig of PPDC-issued scotch to wash down the taste of the mashed potato stuck in the back of his throat. "You spoil him too much, Herc."

He ignores how similar Herc's glare is to Chuck's. And the irony doesn't escape him when this is exactly everything he's been trying to avoid since Lucky's destruction.

.

They lose Crimson Typhoon and Cherno Alpha. It is just as devastating as it sounds, and with Striker Eureka standing motionless in Victoria Harbour; Scott stands in the dark LOCCENT.

And he knows, deep down, that he's never made the wrong decision.

_._

_"You wanted an out." Herc says with the two of them lying on adjacent beds in the medical bay. Orders having just came down that Lucky Seven's headed for Oblivion Bay. "I will give it to you, Scott."_

_"I want one for the both of us." Scott tells him, and he wants to turn on his side, catch his brother's eyes but he aches in places he can touch and then places he can't. And it feels like a minor miracle that both of them can still form coherent sentences. "I don't want to be the only one gone."_

_"I'm not leaving Chuck alone in the program."_

_"… I can respect that."_

_Herc smiles even when it hurts._

.

Family is blood and history, frustration and begrudging love.

Scott freezes up in a fight because he can no longer do this: face life and death and the threat of losing everything he ever loved in this lifetime when he looks at the man strapped into the harness next to him.

And in their shared headspace, in that place that is solely Scott and Hercules Hansen, Herc shakes his head, wraps his arms around his little brother. It reminds them both of how it used to be, how their father would have had a little too much to drink, come home too late, swinging a bottle around too close to his boys' heads. Herc shakes his head, holds him tight, and comes out of the drift swinging his fists to bruise (not break) and a lie already at the tip of his tongue for Scott Hansen's imminent dismissal.

He does this for love, and Scott lets him with the hopes that he will follow with Chuck in toll.

.

"You gave me an out." Scott says, taking a seat at the edge of Herc's bunk. The room is dim, light coming through from the connecting bathroom.

"Do you want another one, Scott?"

"I agreed to come with you and Chuck to Hong Kong. I knew what I was agreeing to."

"Then what do you want from my old man, Uncle Scott?" Chuck is leaning against the bathroom door, a towel wrapped around his waist. Scott glances up at the father and son, and he wants to bark out a laugh at the mirror images the two of them make.

Instead, he says. "I want you to be selfish for once in your life, Herc."

"If I could, neither one of you would be going out there."

"And what? You make the bomb run all by yourself, dad?" Chuck asks, voice hard. "You know it doesn't work like that."

"I know, kid." Herc bites back, and Scott has to try his hardest not to roll his eyes at the two of them. He only tilts his head to get his brother looking at his son, and what Herc faces when he turns has all the bite fading right out of him.

Chuck is careful when he has his father stepping into his arms, and he is much too aware of where Herc's arm is still in a sling. And he is just as careful when he bends his head down to press a kiss to Herc's neck. It may be an apology, it may be a soft pleading _please_.

"It's gonna be alright, dad."

Herc lets out a soft scoff. "Easy for you to say, you're not the only one left behind."

"This isn't goodbye."

Scott catches Chuck's eyes over Herc's shoulders, and the smile twisting over his mouth is grim but they come to a mutual understanding.

They both love Herc too much to let him go like this.

Chuck murmurs something low, something soft, to Herc, has the man turning around in his arms to face Scott once more. And Scott's smile turns wry, "it's the end of the world, Herc. Come here and give me something to come back for."

"The fact that I am still here isn't enough?"

"You tell me, you've been in my head."

"And you've been in mine, dad." Chuck adds, pressing impossibly close from behind Herc, wet hair still dripping with water from his shower, towel slipping further down those hips.

"Come on, big bro." Scott says and there is none of his usual charms. Telling you half the story when he has you begging for more, one hand inching up your skirt, the other running through the ends of your hair to tilt your head back for another perfect kiss.

This is none of that.

So when Chuck has Herc standing between Scott's knees, his mouth tastes of whiskey and one last breath of cigarette smoke. And this too is a perfect kiss when Chuck tilts his daddy's head back to fuck Herc's mouth open with his tongue.

It's nice and slow, like they have all their lives.

It is also an illusion of the very best kind when Scott drags Herc down on to the bed and Chuck follows, dropping his towel to the floor as he pulls his knees up on to the thin mattress.

.

Herc has his good arm thrown over his face but all of the Hansens men have the fairest skin, they hardly need the light from the bathroom to see his blush spreading down to his chest.

"Look at us, Herc." Scott murmurs, his mouth a breath away from Herc's cock.

"Want you to remember this, daddy." Chuck says just as he swipes the flat of his tongue from root to tip. He has one hand wrapped around the base of his daddy's cock, has Herc panting just a little louder, looking a little bit more ruined when Scott swipes a wet tongue over his lips.

Herc bites back on a groan, has him finally painting their faces white at the sight of Chuck and Scott kissing around the head of his cock.

And it's obscene when Scott finally leans back to touch two fingers to his sore jaw, grinning like he knows exactly what he is doing to his brother, cum still clinging to ginger lashes and cheekbones like it's a claim.

Chuck, on the other hand, just presses his cheek to Herc's thigh, rests his head in his lap with a slow spreading smile over his lips. "Hey Uncle Scott, I think we might have broke dad."

Scott snorts, "don't underestimate your old man, he's going to try to prove you wrong, then he's really going to hurt himself."

.

There is a house, thirty minutes drive from the Sydney Shatterdome, bought under his name. A certain Scott Hansen that has been mysteriously discharged from the Jaeger Program.

(Herc never intends to drag his name through mud like that but a blacked out document is more believable than a blank one, and Scott understands that just fine.)

The world doesn't know they are here, Scott's brother and his nephew showing up on his steps, each with a duffel bag in hand, and it doesn't need to know. They never stay long, but it's _something_ when the world is ending and the two of them are at the front lines. Scott never does stop trying to convince Herc that it's better to leave it all behind, but he understands his brother's resolve. He understands Chuck's need for revenge. He hates that he does but he does and he isn't about to force his hand.

Maybe that's why he says yes when Herc asks him to come to Hong Kong.

He likes to think that, as opposed to being the one left behind to bury more empty coffins by the sea he has come to hate.

.

It's easy to forget that this is a last night of sorts when Scott is sitting up with a grin, asking for lube as he strips out of the rest of his clothes. "Want you in me, kiddo."

"Not a kid." Chuck grumbles as he rips a condom open with his teeth.

"I can tell." Scott retorts with a lewd grin over his face as he glances down then back up again. Herc rolls his eyes and pulls his brother a little closer with fingers that leave wet trails of fingerprints as he makes his way down to the cleft of his ass.

The first finger he presses in has Scott closing his eyes, a soft chuckle being let out.

"It's been a while for me…" He says as he spreads his knees just a little further apart, making the angle that much better when he rocks back to take a second and a third finger deeper inside of him.

When Herc finally eases him back, Scott reaches out and takes the condom from Chuck's hand. There is a moment where he sends the father and son team a wink before he pops the condom in his mouth and in one smooth move, leans down to roll the condom on Chuck's cock with his lips and tongue.

"Neat trick." Herc says when Scott moves to straddle Chuck on the bed.

"Didn't learn it from you, that's for sure." Scott throws him a grin but leans back into the warmth when Herc runs a calloused hand down his spine.

"Come on, Uncle Scott."

Maybe it is the reality of the name, or the reality of the situation, or hell, maybe it is something else altogether. But when Scott finally sinks down on Chuck'a cock, Herc feels like he is drifting with them both. Chuck bottoms out, leaves Scott breathless and Herc just as much.

"…You alright, Scotty?" Herc asks as he rests his hand at the base of Scott's spine. Rubbing at the skin right there before he slips a hand down lower to press a finger against the place where Chuck is stretching him wide open.

Scott groans first at the touch and shifts, doesn't know whether he wants to take Herc in as well or try to get away because it is all a little too much.

"Uncle Scott." Chuck grits out as he thrusts up without warning, has Scott pushing down in retaliation like a child.

And like all Hansens men, they don't say what needs to be said (please, _more_, harder, not hard enough), instead everything is said in the push and pull of their bodies. It is said with the slick slide of his cock in his ass, his breaths catching in his throat all wrong, coming out in half pants that hitch when Herc wraps a hand around his cock to get him off.

.

The house isn't a sanctuary.

It's a salvation, a reminder that there is, in fact, life after a war of this scale.

.

"Your boy's pretty when he comes." Scott murmurs when he drags himself off of Chuck with fucked out limbs, rolls over so he is lying with Herc's chest against his back.

"Of course he is." Herc says as he drags a hand down his brother's stomach, fingertips coating in the sticky release. He brings it up to Scott's lips and the ex-Ranger throws him a dirty look before opening his mouth, and it's not so much obedience as it is indulgence.

But before Scott can lick his own cum off of Herc's fingers, Chuck catches his dad at the wrist and ducks his head to suck the fingers into his mouth. The white smears across those lips just as his cheeks hollow out.

"I'm too old for this." Scott exclaims but doesn't look away, Herc simply lets out a growl when Chuck finally lets go with a wet pop.

"Still pretty?"

"Just an arsehole now, kid."

Herc drags his son down to kiss the smirk off of those lips, and Scott is not disappointed to see the two of them kissing over his shoulders. Both of them sharing the taste of him with the way they are pushing their tongues into the other's mouths.

"Good, must run in the family." Chuck says when he pulls back, breathless.

_._

_They are sitting in the kitchen, beers in hand like their RAAF days. _

_Except Chuck is three times the size he used to be, and they've all been in each other's beds. The dog is running in the backyard and Scott doesn't remember when is the last time he's seen Chuck smile like that._

_"We're making a run for the Breach." Herc tells him, and it's not news to either of them, Sydney's Shatterdome is closing in a week and Striker is being decommissioned. Scott takes another swig, "did us no good the first time around."_

_"Can't promise you things will be different but we've got more juice." _

_"Well, I hope Pentecost's got more than a bigger bomb and a discharged Ranger like me." _

_And that is that. _

_(Chuck isn't surprised when his uncle comes with them to Hong Kong, he just smiles that faint, wry thing like he knows. And Scott wouldn't be surprised if he does, kid's always been smartest of the last Hansens men.)_

.

At the edge of their hope, with the world on the line, you would think there's little anyone's got to lose. There are still two Hansens men who go out for Operation Pitfall, just as intended. What isn't is the fact that Hercules Hansen is standing in LOCCENT, a shadow of a man next to the Marshal.

He twists his class ring, again and again, thinking that this must be karma to have to lose everything for the second and the third time together.

What happens next is one for the history books, one that the history books will never get quite right.

XXX Kuro

Open ended because I originally wanted to continue but it felt right to end it here. (Feel free to make the assumption that everyone comes back safe and sound because that's what I'm going with ;D)


End file.
